


Que Va Se Passer à Elle

by pickwicklingpapers



Series: Cophine AUs [12]
Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/F, Soulmate AU, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, im going to be honest lads i did not proofread this so lmk, it's another, this is happier than they usually are i promise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-28
Updated: 2020-03-28
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:15:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,161
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23366050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pickwicklingpapers/pseuds/pickwicklingpapers
Summary: cosima is delphine’s soulmate. it’s clear like water.
Relationships: Delphine Cormier/Cosima Niehaus
Series: Cophine AUs [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/296594
Comments: 5
Kudos: 36





	Que Va Se Passer à Elle

Delphine grew up in France – a place known for its romance. The oldest French poems all refer to soulmates, to the true love and utter trust between the two. It’s influenced French politics, culture, religion. Marriage between two non-soulmates wasn’t allowed until a few years before Delphine’s birth, and even now it’s heavily frowned upon. Children of non-soulmates ranked lower than bastards in the eyes of the French court and modern attitudes haven’t changed much. The dissolution of the French monarchy (the second time) has been attributed to the fact that the King and Queen were not actually soulmates, they just pretended to be, weakening the royal line. Priests were made to burn away their soulmarks before pledging themselves to the Catholic Church, so as not to be tempted. The meeting of two soulmates has always been held as the greatest possible moment in life, the most true pinprick of joy and exquisiteness.

Delphine’s always longed for that. Despite what Felix always presumes, Delphine grew up in a very loving home. Her parents were soulmates and treated each other as such. They were perfect in every way – they challenged each other, loved each other, appreciated each other’s strengths and weaknesses. They were perfect together, and Delphine’s always known that her love will be just the same.

* * *

Delphine has a messy, absentminded scrawl following the arch of her foot. It says _hey sorry you just forgot this in the lab sorry_

* * *

She’s pretending to cry in the corridor, and managing it too, because she’s an ocean away from everything that she’s ever known and whilst the science is fascinating is it the right thing to do, when a gentle hand touches her shoulder and she hears the words that make her freeze.

‘Hey, sorry, y-you just forgot this in the lab, sorry.’

She hadn’t expected this, hadn’t expected this bombshell to come out of nowhere, and it’s a fight to force a smile onto her face. She plays her part, ever the good little soldier, and as Cosima finally leaves, she sits down and cries for real. How can she still do this? How can she let Leekie touch her, wake up every morning and smile at her mark, knowing? Everything Delphine has ever known has told her that soulmates have no secrets. They trust each other implicitly. They have each other’s souls and everything in them. How can Delphine spy on her soulmate? It goes against everything she’s been taught. Every elocution lesson, every grandmother’s lecture, every soulmark legend in France has told her that this is the worst thing she can do. What’s the science worth?

She hadn’t even considered this a possibility. She doesn’t even like women like that. She’d thought through every situation that she might find herself in, planned for every road that she might need to take. But love? That had never been a factor.

Her spot on the floor is getting uncomfortable and the whole point of her role is to stay relatively unnoticed. Having a full-blown breakdown in a corridor doesn’t fulfil that criteria, and she can only imagine what Leekie would say. Leekie can’t know about this, he can’t find out about Delphine’s mark. Delphine’ll lie and sneak and commit any crime against humanity that he wants, but she can’t betray her soulmate like this. She’s breaking so many moral codes just by being here, but she can substitute those with scientific reasoning. She can rationalise the spying and the lying with blind trials and unimpeded subject behaviour. She can’t rationalise giving Leekie her heart.

She pulls herself together, brushes her hair out of her red-rimmed eyes. She straightens her jacket and reminds herself that there’s two Delphines from now on – science Delphine with her monitoring activities, and Delphine, Cosmia’s soulmate. Leekie gets one, Cosima gets the other, and she gets to juggle the two.

* * *

Delphine doesn’t broach it, because how can you tell the woman that you’re marking ‘hey, I think we might be soulmates’ You don’t. It’s against every protocol there is, every single culture’s moral code, to tell a person that you may be their soulmate. Every culture has something different, some little ritual, but you never outright say it. If you miss your chance, like Delphine has, because one of you didn’t realise or you weren’t expecting it, then you have your work cut out for you. But you never, ever, just say it. Shakespeare wrote plays about the stuff, Wilde wrote novels, Plath wrote poems. Austen wrote about soulmates who hated each other but grew to appreciate one another. Hugo wrote about soulmates in the midst of revolution. Bronte wrote about soulmates who were separated by class and non-soulmate wives locked in the attic. There’s a hundred thousand myths and legends about soulmates who are separated, soulmates who missed each other, soulmates who never quite click. But they all agree – you don’t broach the subject. You never outright tell the other person. It’s just Not Done.

She sighs.

She never thought it would be so complicated when she took this job. She expected some ground-breaking science, a little bit of slightly illegal genetic manipulation. She didn’t expect this. She didn't expect to find the other half of herself barely thirty seconds in.

* * *

There’s a thin line across Cosima’s ribs. It’s a handwriting that Delphine’s unfamiliar with, and she traces it with a trembling finger.

It seems that Delphine was correct not to broach the subject. She’s Cosima’s, but it seems Cosima’ll never be hers. There’s a million French tragedy’s based on this – songs and plays and poems – but Delphine never thought she could be this unlucky. She never thought that after all she’d lost, she’d have to lose this too. She has a choice now – confess all to Leekie and ask to be reassigned. He’d probably accept, he’s not completely heartless. She’d get to run away, never see Cosima again. She can ignore that any of this ever happened. Or, she can take the second option. She can keep her silence, seal her lips, and stay close to the woman who will never love her back. As enticing as option one is, she can’t bring herself to bid adieu to being part of Cosima’s life. She’s never going to be whole at this rate, but she can keep tearing herself in half.

The tragedies all end in just that. French romance has never been particularly hopeful. She’ll take the road of tragic romance and try not to wither too quickly. She’ll be like the wraith woman in the story her aunt used to tell, who lost her soulmate and never recovered. Instead of sitting by a river and weeping until she grows into a willow, however, she’ll become a steel beam and support Cosima against anyone who would hurt her. She’ll protect Cosima from Leekie and Rachel and anyone who would do the sisters harm.

It looks like there’s always going to be two Delphines– science Delphine with her monitoring activities, and Delphine, a woman who’s soulmate won’t have her.

* * *

‘I hope I meet them someday,’ says Cosima, ‘but that doesn’t mean I like you any less.’

* * *

She pretends to be uncomfortable discussing her soulmark, says that the French keep them very secret. In her culture, it’s something that only soulmates should get to know about each other. It’s only half a lie. Cosima respects that – Cosima’s good like that. It’s an easy thing to keep hidden from her. Shoes and socks and tights hide it most of the time, and it’s not really an area that even Cosima sees. It’s easy for her hide.

Does Cosima remember their first words? There’s no reason for her too. They don’t mean anything to her. Delphine’s not stupid, she knows that Cosima likes her, but she recognises that this isn’t Cosima’s endgame. Cosima sees this as a stepping stone relationship, nothing much more. Delphine’s just passing her time. Delphine might be well and truly in over her head, but Cosima’s got bigger issues than a college fling. She’s finding out that she’s a clone, she’s having secretive meetings, and she’s really helpfully writing it all down for Delphine to find.

So yeah, Delphine keeps it quiet. She dissuades any discussion about soulmarks to stop her heart breaking in two, and she carries on with her life. She lies and she steal and she cheats. She selectively passes on information to Leekie. She takes Cosima to bed, closes her eyes, and pretends that Cosima loves her too.

* * *

In a way, it’s good that Cosima’s not her soulmate. She doesn’t deserve Cosima’s trust, not with what she’s doing.

* * *

She wants Cosima to trust her, but she wants her to live more. She leaves Cosima’s side but she doesn’t promise not to return. She straightens her hair and her shoulders and her spine. She slips her feet into the highest heels she can find. She puts on a power suit and feels anything but powerful. She feels small and weak. She feels like the dirt beneath Rachel’s shiny shoes.

It’s personal. It’s so, so personal, and it never can’t be. She takes Rachel’s orders like a good child, but she doesn’t necessarily like it. She makes plans and promises. She breaks those same promises and makes devil deals in their place. Delphine feels like she’s losing herself in a whirlwind. There’s so much going on, all of the time. There’s all the sisters to juggle. To manipulate and be manipulated by. There’s Cosima’s illness. There’s Kira’s entire existence to contemplate. She’s losing the ability to separate the two Delphines. They’re driving her insane, in her head, they’re constantly at war constantly arguing, but at least they agree on something. Cosima comes first. Cosima gets what she needs (but not necessarily what she wants).

She’s half a person and she knows she’ll never be full.

* * *

Shay’s not Cosima’s soulmate either, and thank christ for that. Delphine likes to think that she’s a pretty good person at heart. She gives to charity, she protects the sisters, and she tends to like most people. Shay? Shay she absolutely, gut-wrenchingly, viscerally hates. The girl’s done nothing to her – apart from sleeping with her soulmate and living weirdly beyond her means – but Delphine just can’t help the hate that she feels. It’s an ugly feeling and she’s not sure that she likes it, but sometimes at night she sits and traces the curve of her foot and thinks that the pain feels good. At least with pain, she feels something.

Sarah shouts and rages. Cosima shouts and rages. Alison shouts and rages. Rachel…doesn’t shout, but then Rachel’s always been the odd one out. The other sisters are so similar, so strikingly the same that sometimes one of them turns in the light and Delphine can’t breathe. Rachel though, Rachel’s different. Delphine can use that.

The clones hate her. Delphine hates herself too. But she carries on, she does her paperwork and her duty. She wears blacks and greys and navy blues and dreams of soft grey cardigans. It’s funny, she thinks, how her outfits have changed with her life. She used to be free as a cloud and dressed in pastel, now she’s sunk in concrete and dressed just as drably. She’s a terrible person doing terrible things. She thinks of that little girl in the hallway of a university and what she’s done since and she disgusts herself. As glad as she is that Shay’s not Cosima’s soulmate, she’s glad that she’s not either.

* * *

It’s easier to protect Cosima, she thinks, when she doesn’t have to look at her every day. Doesn’t have to wonder if today is the day that she loses her forever. It’s easier to just sit in her office. She receives reports, black and white characters telling her Cosima’s white blood cell count and iron levels in the most impersonal way possible. It’s easier to pretend that they’ve never met, that she doesn’t know her. It’s easier to pretend that she’s never heard the words etched onto her skin.

It’s easier to pretend that she doesn’t utterly love her.

At the beginning, she couldn’t understand why Cosima wasn’t her soulmate in return, but now she gets it. She’s not blind to the morally grey things that Cosima has done, but Cosima is a blinding light in the world. At her heart, she’s good. She always tries to do her best. She fights for what’s right, even when she knows that it’s hopeless. Delphine is malleable and pliant. She’s done terrible things for other people’s agendas. She doesn’t have a driving force behind her, not like Cosima, not like Rachel, not like Sarah. She’s just a good little soldier, doing what she’s told even when she knows it’s wrong. She’s selfish. She’s disingenuous. She’s a liar. Of course Cosima’s not her soulmate. Cosima’s too good for her.

* * *

As she dies, she thanks god that she doesn’t have to watch Cosima meet her soulmate.

**Author's Note:**

> in celebration of the confirmation of what we all knew - seven of nine is queer (she and chakotay were only together because they're both hopelessly in love with queen of my heart kathryn janeway; change my mind)
> 
> maybe we won't have another year gap whoops


End file.
